Introduction

Sue Suprianos Steppin Out of Babylon is a radio interview series covering a broad range of important issues in todays world: peace and war, human and civil rights, communication, the media, the environment, food security, racism, globalization, immigration and matters of the spirit. Over 250 shows are available at this site!

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James Howard Kunstler

The Long Emergency: Surviving the Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-First Century

James Howard Kunstler is the author of The Long Emergency: Surviving the Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-First Century. He is also the author of three other nonfiction books, The Geography of Nowhere, Home from Nowhere, and The City in Mind: Notes on the Urban Condition, as well as nine novels. He has been an editor with Rolling Stone and his articles have appeared in the New York Times Magazine and the Atlantic Monthly.

In this interview he addresses the issues of the decline of the cheap energy from fossil fuels on which the industrialized world is built. He predicts epochal changes to our social relations, economy , and political system that are today are unimaginable for us to grasp, though it would be to our benefit to do so in order to develop a smoother transition to the post industrial age. Climate change is also part of the emerging catastrophes leading to this emergency which will change everything. Life will become more local, globalism and the consumer economy will wither, we will struggle to feed ourselves and the United States may not hold together as a nation. Epidemic disease and faltering agriculture will synergize with energy scarcities to send nations reeling and all that could mean to our national and international relations. There is no "Techno-fix" that will permit us to run things the way we are and to which we are accustomed. Suburbia will really have to be farm land.

As he says "We are entering uncharted territory of history" and we will have to downscale every activity of everyday life, from farming, to schooling, to retail trade. We will be staying where we already are. In Kunstler's opinion, based on the true story of where we are won the downward slope of "peak oil", this process has already begun. It is incumbent on us to voluntarily start to scaledown, cooperate, and live sustainably because soon enough it will not be a choice. Let's get started!!